Talk:Alan Shepard

His college major

What was Shepard's major at the Naval Academy? Please answer in the article. Thanks.CountMacula (talk) 18:48, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

Alan Shepard spent eight (???) hours in the capsule

@Hawkeye7: The text says: "After being strapped into the capsule's seat, launch delays kept him in that suit for eight hours; Shepard's endurance gave out before launch, and he was forced to empty his bladder into the suit..." The source: https://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2013/06/the-science-and-history-of-space-urination.html/ This source doesn't seem to be very reliable if it makes such glaring mistakes. See what the Mercury-Redstone 3 article says (emphasis added): "All of the delays resulted in Shepard lying on his back in the capsule for almost three hours, by which point he complained to the blockhouse crew that he had a severe need to urinate..." Or: "He entered the spacecraft at 5:15 am. ... Mercury-Redstone 3 finally lifted off at 9:34 am." This means that the total time Shepard stayed inside the capsule was 4 hours 19 minutes. P.S. Actually, he started entering the capsule at 5:18 according to Burgess (p. 122). 5:15 is the time when he boarded the elevator (Burgess, p. 121). Taurus Littrow (talk) 23:23, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

What was the time when he donned the space suit? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 23:25, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) That's the question; one thing we have to bear in mind, is that the suit was put on before he entered the capsule, therefore time inside the suit would have been longer than 4 hours 19 minutes; though, admittedly that doesn't necessarily account for all of the supposed extra four hours. Since he was the first astronaut to fly, perhaps suit preparation took longer than it later took? JustinTime55 (talk) 23:30, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

• First, regardless of how much Shepard stayed in the suit, the wording of the sentence is still quite confusing: "After being strapped into the capsule's seat, launch delays kept him in that suit for eight hours": It makes it look as if he stayed in the capsule eight hours. I'd reword it.
• Now, let's see how much Shepard stayed in his suit. Burgess doesn't mention clearly when Shepard started donning his suit, but it happened much less than eight hours before launch, since Shepard woke up at 1:10 (8 hours and a half before the launch eventually occurred), shaved, showered, took breakfast, and then went to the doctor. This is from Burgess: "Altogether, the medical and psychiatric assessments took a little under two hours. [...] Shepard was then assisted in donning his space suit. [...] At 3:55 a.m., carrying his portable air-conditioning unit, Shepard began to make his way downstairs." So the launch occurred 5 hours and a half after Shepard ended donning his spacesuit. Eight hours was the total time from Shepard's waking up until the launch. Taurus Littrow (talk) 06:56, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

• Another wrong statement from the same source is this (emphasis added): "...he was forced to empty his bladder into the suit, which shorted out the medical sensors attached to it to track the astronaut's condition in flight." - Well, that's not true, since the power had been turned off, a fact correctly pointed out in the Mercury-Redstone article: "...he [Shepard] told them to simply turn the power off. They complied, and Shepard emptied his bladder." Burgess mentions that, too (p. 134). Really, that source seems very unreliable (I found two mistakes already), and this is a featured article. I suggest to use some other source or sources. Taurus Littrow (talk) 07:54, 3 December 2020 (UTC)
• The first sentence sounds a bit sensationalist: Something not seen at the time by the public was Shepard's pre-launch "emergency". The last sentence seems irrelevant altogether, as it's not related to Shepard or his flight: After Shepard's flight, NASA called in the space suit's manufacturer, B. F. Goodrich, and by the time of John Glenn's Mercury-Atlas 6 orbital flight the following year, a liquid waste collection feature had been built into the suit. Why not just copypaste the respective part from the MR-3 article? Taurus Littrow (talk) 08:35, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

  Because that part of the Mercury-Redstone 3 article is unsourced. There is a footnote that points to Shepard's book, but to a non-existent page 383, and the real page does not support what the text says. So that part of the MR-3 article has to be deleted and rewritten. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 09:27, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

  Yes, indeed, I just looked it up. That incident is described by other (more reliable) sources, though: Burgess (pp. 131-134) and Thompson (pp. 293-294). And both sources mention that the power was turned off. What do you think? Taurus Littrow (talk)

  I have rewritten the section, using the better sources. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:25, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Criticism

I think the account of Apollo 14 should include criticism of Shepard by scientists. According to the FA article on the mission, its geological results were disappointing because Shepard refused to take the training seriously. Dudley Miles (talk) 13:09, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

I think Wehwalt wrote that article. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 05:39, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

I think the Apollo 14 article provides a nuanced view of things. He wasn't enthusiastic about geology but he did have a lot on his plate after a decade on the ground. The extent to which that contributed to the inability to reach the rim of Cone Crater is left to the reader. Possibly something could be said here.--Wehwalt (talk) 12:11, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

Thanks Wehwalt. The Apollo 14 article covers activities on the Moon very well, and I decided to only summarise here. That may have resulted in a less balanced view. My sources indicate that the ornery "icy commander" was completely absent during this period, and that he trained hard for Apollo 14. Like most astronauts he had little interest in geology, but this was not what kept him from reaching the rim of the Cone Crater. Despite his age, his stamina was rated the highest of any moon walker by the NASA doctors. My understanding is that the decision to turn back was dictated by concerns about having sufficient oxygen to get back to the LM. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:17, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

I was thinking about the comment about the geological training: "The effectiveness of the training was limited by a lack of enthusiasm shown by Shepard, which set the tone for Mitchell." Also geologist Lee Silver: "The Apollo 14 crews did not have the right attitude, did not learn enough about their mission, had the burden of not having the best possible preflight photography, and they weren't ready." The complaints were not about the failure to reach Cone Crater (which according to the article was due to exhaustion) but about the samples from the distance they did reach. Articles should cover criticisms, otherwise they are unbalanced. Dudley Miles (talk) 22:28, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

Climbing Cone Ridge - Where Are We?: 33:23:23 Haise: And, Ed and Al, we've already eaten in our 30-minute extension and we're past that now. I think we'd better proceed with the sampling and continue with the EVA.

Shepard, from the 1971 Technical Debrief - "If we'd gotten to the point where we'd been willing to do away with the rest of the traverse (that is, do their work at the Cone rim and then proceed directly back to the LM without stopping), we could have made the rim all right. But I personally wasn't willing to do that. I felt that gathering more samples was the better of the two choices. We looked at the map again today and described two boulder fields that indicate that we were probably within 150 to 300 feet - depending on these two boulder fields - of the rim and still were not able to see it. That was a pretty good-sized lunar feature, to be that close to the top of the thing and not see it. That is just part of the navigation problem."

Nothing about exhaustion, just time. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:45, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

That is not what the Apollo 14 article says but it is beside the point. Shepard was not criticised for failing to reach the rim but because his lack of enthusiasm for geological training adversely affected their ability to choose and correctly label the best geological specimens. The article should cover this point. Dudley Miles (talk) 11:13, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

How many years is Alan Shepard Old ?

Can Anyone Answer ? 115.98.109.111 (talk) 12:56, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Merger proposal

@Hawkeye7: Any objection to merging Shepard's Prayer into Alan Shepard (leaving it as a redirect)? Currently just 2 sentences and seems unlikely to be expanded. Random fixer upper (talk) 19:41, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

No objection. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:09, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

I support the merging, why has this not been done yet? 2.38.150.183 (talk) 11:10, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Ok, thanks -- added it to the 'In popular culture' section and changed the Shepard's Prayer page back to a redirect. Random fixer upper (talk) 01:28, 19 May 2023 (UTC)